Arts, Film & Events
New West Book Review
Robert T. Self’s “Robert Altman’s McCabe & Mrs. Miller”
Robert Altman's McCabe & Mrs. Miller: Reframing the American West
By Robert T. Self
University Press of Kansas, 208 pages, $29.95
In his new book, Robert T. Self beautifully describes the opening of Altman's famous Western:
"The camera pans slowly across a moody gray landscape of mountain evergreens lit intermittently by the autumn gold and red of changing leaves. A lone rider materializes from this forest under a cold rain…Swathed in a red bearskin coat, the rider slumps in the saddle as his horse and packhorse slowly pick their way along a faint trail against the steady moaning of the wind and the song."
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Steve miller band, carole king and bruce willis
Ketchum Kick Ash Bash Brings in Big Name Acts, Honors FirefightersHe may be a joker, but he’s no smoker. In fact, he wants to kick some ash.
Hailey-based rock star Steve Miller and fellow Hailey celebrity Bruce Willis, along with his band, Bruce Willis Blues Band, will perform this weekend at the Kick Ash Bash, a celebration of firefighters, local leadership and community members who helped preserve the Wood River Valley during the city-threatening flames of the recent Castle Rock Fire.
Not to be forgotten, singer-songwriter and Idaho resident Carole King will also perform at the Bash - in addition to a slew of other performers.
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Saturday Day's Alright
Museum Day: Free Admission to Boise Museums SaturdayMuseums aren’t just for art and artifacts – they are for birds and gardens and human rights, and yes, really old stuff, too, like rocks and history. Don’t believe me? Check out one of the nine Boise museums participating in Museum Day, a national program presented by Smithsonian magazine and Hyundai Motor America.
Or check out all of the museums, because on Saturday, Sept. 29, all the museums and cultural institutions in Boise and others around the nation will be open for free in an effort to celebrate the country’s cultural offerings while sharing information and bringing people together. It is the third annual Museum Day.
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The possibilities of more than one mind
Off the Grid: Collaborating CreativityCreativity: using imagination to develop new and original ideas; sometimes preformed unaccompanied, but more invigorating when collaborated with others.
Bozeman is home to “creative live wires,” a plethora of professionals in the marketing, advertising, architecture, media and design fields. Hence, the creation of Off the Grid, a forum to network Bozeman’s professional creative arts community.
“This is a chance for everyone in our field to get together, celebrate, collaborate and put Bozeman on the map,” said Jeff Welch of Mercury Advertising.
Off the Grid is hosting their first event with Alex Bogusky, the innovative mind behind the global ad campaigns like Mini Cooper, Burger King and The Truth on September 2.
Update: Last night was a success, filling the Emerson Ballroom with a diverse group who are keen on cultivating the creative community within Bozeman. Stay tuned for more speakers, workshops and networking with Off the Grid. And if any ideas cross your mind on the future direction of this group, contact info@offthegridbozeman.com.
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Special Photo Gallery
The Rocky Mountain School of Photography Student Show 2007
If you've lived in Missoula for any length of time you may have noticed a peculiar seasonal phenomenon that occurs in early summer. Just as the university students ship out and the streets quiet down, the weather warms and the river is good for floating, a large flock of folks bearing all manner of photography gear fills our streets. They wander, they stare, they tilt their heads this way and that, and sometimes they ask you for a photograph.
These wandering shutterbugs are the latest class of students attending the Rocky Mountain School of Photography's Summer Intensive program, an 11-week boot camp of sorts with the aim of refining raw photographic talent into the stuff of which art and careers are made....
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earth, steel and fire
Firefighters Respite: Boise Unveils New Public Art Sculpture
Firefighters in Idaho had their work cut out for them this year, and to honor the brave ones, Boise artist Mark Baltes created a public art sculpture titled "Firefighters Respite."
The monument, erected in Riverside Park, is a red steel fire hose balancing on posts crafted to look like hands holding the pipe. It’s at hip-level on purpose so that the public can sit, lean, hang on the sculpture and check out historic firefighter photos and information that compares volunteer firefighters of yore to modern, highly trained emergency professionals.
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Film Review
Vida Loca. Off the Grid: Life on the Mesa
Jeremy and Randy Stulberg spent two years documenting the lifestyles of the poor and infamous “homeless” residents of a New Mexico mesa. I found the result riveting. I led the same sort of life while I was working at a truck stop in northern Arizona. I parked my 14 foot trailer in various locations in the national forest behind the store and pointed my solar panel at the sun to charge the bank of deep-cycle batteries that ran my computer, radio, black-and-white television and mobile phone. I filled up a five gallon propane tank and a water tank once a month and washed my laundry in the machines by the trucker’s lounge. [more]
montana festival of the book
Missoula Bookfest Celebrates the Voices of the West
Want a chance to mingle with novelists, poets, and playwrights from around the West? To hear Governor Brian Schweitzer read a children’s book in Caras Park? To find out if Missoula Mayor John Engen can correctly define "peripatetic"?
Then check out the eighth annual Montana Festival of the Book, which will be held in and around downtown Missoula September 13-15.
Festival Coordinator Kim Anderson of Humanities Montana says that along with the usual readings and panel discussions this year’s bookfest is offering many new and unique events.
The festival "is just such a Missoula event," Mayor John Engen says. "There are more and better writers here per capita than you’ll find anywhere else in the West."
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UM apologizes for ticket bungle
Missoula Elton John Fans Wait, for Nothing
While thousands of people across Missoula waited in line Wednesday for a shot at tickets to Elton John's show at the University of Montana Sept. 28, almost all of the tickets were snatched up -- in a matter of 20 minutes -- by buyers on the Internet, ticking off all the folks who wasted their time. This morning, the University apologized.
"...sellers at The Source, Worden's Market, and Southgate Mall were unable to capture any inventory from the system to make a sale," Adams Center director Mary Muse said in a statement. "We sincerely apologize to our outlets and those that took the time to stand in line."
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BozemanEvents.Net Weekend Roundup
Festivals: Yellowstone Music, Madison Art, Norris Bluegrass
Norris Bluegrass Festival
It’s time to take a bath with your friends while listening to some of that good ‘ole time bluegrass at Norris Hot Springs. The pool alongside their new grill and outside BBQ, with a cool brew, is quite the setting for an afternoon. From 4-10pm on Monday, enjoy the music of Jawbone Railroad, Stormy Creek and of course, Norris’ own Thermal Grass.
Yellowstone Music & Arts Festival
Come rock at the Arch with an array of musicians and good times at the entrance of Yellowstone National Park in Gardiner on Sunday, Sept. 2nd. The lineup this year includes old-time country band, the Wilders. Other musicians include: Laura Love, Ruby Dee and the Snakehandlers, Chanman Roots Band, Jawbone Railroad, Jessica Kilroy and other local acts. Arts and Crafts will fill the park with good perusing. A good float on the Yellowstone River is in order to accompany this trip.
Madison Fly Fishing Festival
The annual Ennis on the Madison Fly Fishing Festival will be hosted by a project of the Madison River Foundation and Moonlight Basin. Opening night will take place on the banks of the Madison at Moonlight Basin’s camp, near Ennis with keynote, Mike Lawson along with an auction of original paintings from several Montana artists who took part in the project “One Day on the Madison.”
If your not disappearing into the wild stretches of Montana this weekend, BozemanEvents.Net has a urban link on what to do.
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